As I had been warned about hardware projects—even hardware-light ones like ours—we have had a surprise disappointment or two in getting the physical items we need from suppliers (e.g., that our IR blasters were no longer being manufactured, and we had to find a supplier with a bunch of them sitting in storage), but that merely used up a time buffer we had intentionally placed before shipping. We're still on pace as long as no further big surprises come.

Thanks, Brian. The box is designed with a slanted top face. I don't have the exact measurements on me, but I think it's between 15 and 30 degrees from the table/counter surface. So the smart device's camera will almost point straight down, but it will be angled enough to look past the surface the box is on.

In the videos, we generated robot behavior with a combination of remote control—which allows for scripted scenes that illustrate features succinctly—and 1 or 2 autonomous scenes. If you want to know what functionality was already implemented during the campaign, you can get a good idea from this Kickstarter Live demo I did: https://www.youtube.com/watch….

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Superbacker

Great article. This appears to be a new concept in AI making more human in appearance. What is actually being used in the videos with the hexbots demonstrations since the project is still in development phase. Currently autonomus control of some sort or more human guided puppeteer control. Thanks

The robots are controlled by a model of a human developer who puppeteered/teleoperated a robot in many different situations. The model can answer the question: "In context X, what is the probability that the teleoperator would have given command Y?"

When a robot is acting based on the model, it is choosing what to do according to those probabilities, multiple times per second. So its behavior isn't random in the colloquial sense of the word—that it does every possible action with the same frequency—but it is random in the mathematical sense: the robot will often make different choices in the same situation, though those choices are still aligned with the frequency at which its model thinks the human developer would have made them in the current context.

Regarding the robots' learning through your teaching, we'll be excited to share more about how that works once it's finalized and confirmed to work intuitively through user testing.

Superbacker

Brad - hope to generate some more discussion with the group. I think this is an amazing project, like having a little Mars rover controlled by the phone. Still curious on 2 things.
1) Learning mode, your video mentions this too. Can you provide an update some day on what this does.
2) Still like to understand running the same routine multiple times. Will the Hexbot run the same routine each time? If different their is decision processes in play, or just random - but that still seems like a decision to me.

• We have no definitive plans to make Bots Alive robots learn from all its experience, outside the explicit teaching sessions during which they will learn. We're interested in this direction long-term, but combining (a) the algorithms that learn in this way (e.g., reinforcement learning algorithms) with (b) the need for them to be enjoyable to interact with is, to my knowledge, an unsolved engineering challenge (by us or anyone).

• I'd love to say we have the app complete 3 months ahead of time, but it's still in development and on schedule. ;)

Superbacker

I thought the group would be interested in your input. Does the Hexbot learn from its trials. If presented with the same obstacles multiple times, is the result random or does it improve its path? Also is the app complete at this time or in development? Thanks

Superbacker

SilverAnvil, the Battle Spiders have different IR codes, so they won't work unless we take the time to sniff out their signals. We might do that, but we can't promise it at this point. Do check in with us though!

Schaap, the add-on pack is 10 red obstacle blocks only.

Brian, I think I sent you a private message about this, but thanks for pushing us past $30K a few days ago!!!

Brad, did Amazon come through? If so, any luck with the Battle Spiders? I'm hoping that they use the same IR Channel for movement as the regular Spiders and the other two channel is for the "laser gun" LED.

Hey, all. This doesn't seem quite worthy of an Kickstarter update, but my first child is due to be born in 7 days. So if I go AWOL at some unannounced time, there's a good chance she's arriving early. (!!) I hope you'll forgive my absence if that happens.

Brad,
On Jan 25th someone asked about using Hexbug® Battle Spiders. You said no because "the top of the Battle Spider is too uneven for easy usage of the robot decals." I'm curious if that's the only problem or if the infrared controller can't talk to them.
If it's just that their heads are to uneven, I might try modding them a bit - but if it's a problem with the controller then that's a different story.
Thanks!

Hi Brad Knox, I have several old iPhones and iPads devices which are max out at iOS 9 (or earlier) -- no longer support for iOS upgrades. I was wondering if you can make sure the iOS app will support older iOS 9 or earlier so that I can give my 6 and 8 year older to use.

Superbacker

Great live feed today. It is really unique to engage with creator directly. Just happened to find it while taking checking at lunch. Kickstarter live is something I had not see before. Will need to check out other projects. If you post in advance as an update then all the current supporters would get a heads up.

The option you're referring to is the 2 BOTS_ALIVE DOUBLE BOT KITS, which is two complete sets of two Hexbug Spiders and the bots_alive smartphone kit.

The four Spiders could not all be used together, controlled by the same smartphone, because they only have two infrared control channels. Instead, the usage I imagine for 2 BOTS_ALIVE DOUBLE BOT KITS is that two different people would each have one of the kits and two of the robots. So if you wanted one BOTS_ALIVE DOUBLE BOT KIT for yourself and one to give as a gift, that would be a good reason to get the 2 BOTS_ALIVE DOUBLE BOT KITS tier.

Thanks, jdaiglejr. Check out our FAQ, which has the answer to your question.

The short answer is that we do not currently plan to open up the software for programming, but we'll be listening to our supporters to figure out what we should do next with this technology. One of numerous options is to support programming in some way.

Hi. I am very intrigued by this project and robotic in general. I do have a question though. I choose a pledge with 4 bots in there (the one at 168$) but this has written that it comes with the possibility to make 2 bots come alive. I am not sure what is the point of having 4 bots? Am I missing something?